


What He Never Said

by macabre



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Coming of Age, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-24
Updated: 2012-01-24
Packaged: 2017-11-08 12:32:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,778
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/443223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/macabre/pseuds/macabre
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU. Alex is the new boy at Charles’ prestigious boarding school. Alex doesn’t talk much. Charles doesn’t mind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What He Never Said

Alex Summers is some kind of charity case; everyone in the school knows this, whether student, faculty, or custodian. Most pretend this doesn’t influence their opinion of him, however when rumors of a dark past begin to arise about the boy in question, the halls get a little quieter when he walks there, and the available seats open in the back corner of classrooms, far from other occupants. Nasty rumors spread within the first week of his arrival about the quiet blonde boy that, besides from an inability to smile or speak, looks fairly harmless.

Which is precisely why Charles seeks him out. Charles who is seemingly friendly with everyone and friends with no one really. He keeps an eye on the new student from the first day; it’s day nine when he realizes that Alex looks tired all the time. Although he’s got more muscle definition than Charles or a lot of the other students, coddled as most of them have always been, Alex moves with a caution the other student recognizes all too well.

Alex, who never seems bothered to sit in the back row of the class, keeping an alert eye on every little movement in the class instead of falling asleep, and who sits nearest the exit in the dining room, always the last one in and the first to leave. Outdoors he sits with his back against a tree or fence like they’re anchors. He hardly ever speaks to anyone, unless it’s a teacher, but many of them leave the charity case alone, even in class.

And yet, Charles finds Alex behind the kitchens feeding the small herd of stray cats that now live around the premises. He pets them so gently, picking up one of the smallest and cradling it to his chest to keep it warm in the strong wind. It’s autumn – the trees are mostly bald and the weather beginning to turn nasty.

It’s after hours one night when Charles follows Alex down to the lake and watches him take a dive in the icy waters. He stays submerged so long that Charles drifts closer, a few steps at a time. He’s about to shout – what, he doesn’t know – when a pale head appears.

The Summers boy silently watches Charles. Like he’s holding his breath again. Charles finds himself likewise holding his breath, his cheeks a flaming red of embarrassment. There’s nothing to do but submit to the situation; Charles reaches a hand out for Alex to haul him out.

They march back to their halls; Alex quietly following Charles, dripping a little still on the smooth floors. His body in complete control – despite the overbearing chill both outdoors and indoors, Alex never once shivers.

The previously stiff white shirt clings to the boy’s slight frame in such a way it’s hardly present at all – the skin underneath is clearly visible. All too visible. Even under the dim lights in the hallway, the blemishes and discolorations can be seen. Scars older than others. Long and straight. Jagged. Perfectly round.

Cigarette burns, Charles absently thinks. Dazed, he reaches for Alex and yanks him to a stop. He pushes up one of the long sleeves, just to check. To see them fully and clearly. Alex doesn’t stop him, or look at him. His jaw clenches.

“I’m sorry.” Charles doesn’t let go until he feels it, finally, a slight tremble under his hand. He can’t do anything except watch Alex disappear again.

Things change after that; not because Alex behaves any differently, but because Charles begins sitting by him in class, abandoning his front row seat. They eat at their own table, surrounded by more than a handful of mockingly empty chairs. After inviting himself in, the older student finds Alex has smuggled in one of the kittens in his room. His room which, Charles notes, is significantly smaller and colder than any of his other peers’ room he’s been in.

Their conversations are all one sided. It’s alright, really, because Charles knows how Alex’s day went. He was there for most of it. Sometimes Charles gives up talking to his blonde boy; other days, he doesn’t shut up, having found someone who will listen to him ramble about his latest theories. His companion looks at him so intensely during these sessions, Charles really believes he could solve any mystery.

He also feels incomplete. Charles has never really been a child – he never behaved like one and was certainly never treated like one. He sometimes stops and thinks about what he’s missed and still missing. The other students his age are constantly being caught sneaking off grounds, running as far and as fast as possible for those sacred few hours of freedom.

Charles never leaves. Alex never leaves either. This would be okay if they could at least discuss it. He’s finally growing weary of the silence. Charles begins to feel trapped, noticing for perhaps the first time his adolescence passing him by. He clings stubbornly to the other boy despite the new and ridiculous rumors surrounding the two of them. His comrade never says anything about them, of course.

In the dead of winter, Charles sits alone on the dock where he pulled Alex out of the water. Alex isn’t there because he never follows Charles; it’s always been Charles following Alex, trusting in time that the other boy might do the same. Instead, Alex sits in the library, where Charles should be, in the same place he left him.

Prematurely wiping away a few tears, Charles leaves the dock. Leaves Alex alone. He doesn’t eat dinner with him that night, or sit with him in class the next day, because Charles decides to skip and stay in bed with Fitzgerald, who Charles tries to argue is just as good of company. It’s too cold to move from beneath his quilt, so he skips his breakfast and lunch that day too.

Sighing, Charles slowly chews an old granola bar he had at the bottom of his bag. He doesn’t remember when he put it there. When he finishes, he falls back in bed and leaves the wrapper on top of his sheets as he pulls them around his shoulders, curling into the wall.

There’s no knock at the door to hear – it’s the shadow on the wall that startles Charles into awareness. “Fuck, Alex!” He clutches at his chest, huffing as he sits up.

The other boy has a tray of food in his hands. Charles glances at it, his stomach growling. “Yes, well, do come in,” he says as already Alex sits on his bed, gently placing the tray over Charles’ lap. He picks up the pear on the corner and quietly chews as Charles happily spoons some soup.

So busy eating, it takes him a moment to realize Alex is curiously looking around his room. It’s a single, and a large one at that. He begins to feel terribly guilty of his possessions; he owns far too many books, honestly he doesn’t know what possessed him to bring so many to school, but they really are his biggest indulgence – he stops this train of thought as Alex picks up the closest book to him.

“Have you read it? It’s fantastic, although I admit the plot is a little gimmicky, but I think the author really –“ Thunk. The book lands on the floor. Charles tries to push down the feeling of rejection once again.

Alex is chewing his lip, still glancing around the room while Charles chews on a slice of bread. He stops eating, glancing down at his arms. He swallows and glances at Alex, at his long sleeves and long eyelashes. Charles moves the tray to the side and pulls off his shirt all in one quick motion.

Alex glances over sharply, his face as blank as the first time Charles ever spoke to him or insisted on helping him with his chemistry work. He watches carefully for it – the moment of recognition on his face.

One hand reaches for it, to idly trace it. It’s a scar that runs down most of his left arm. A thin white line. “My stepbrother. I couldn’t run fast enough that day,” he says. Alex looks away again as if this was the morning news over the intercom, and the chill of the room sets in. Charles hunches in on himself. Crosses his arms.

After he pulls his shirt back on (backwards), he sees it. The tick in Alex’s jaw. He jumps, the sound is so strange to him for a moment. Teeth grinding. Back and forth.

Alex wants to say something. Charles knows it, possibly for the first time. But what he says isn’t what he’s expecting: “Get up.”

Alex is leading Charles, not because Charles is following, but because Alex drags Charles by the hand outside, his shirt still misplaced and his shoes only half on. He trips, falling forward onto Alex’s back – a very warm back – and the warmth spreads through his body.

He squeezes the hand in his.

When they get to the dock, Alex pulls off Charles’s shirt and then his own. Their scars barely visible but they’re all Charles can look at. He dives in first, with proper form because it wasn’t until a few years ago that he took proper swim lessons. When he surfaces, Alex is laughing at him. He pirouettes and waves with fanciful motion before jumping into clumsily.

“It’s freezing,” Charles complains, already shivering. Alex just rolls his eyes. “I know, I know – don’t be a baby,” he continues, because he’s already imagined just the way Alex would respond to this. “But you’ve seen me play field hockey, and what a disaster that is. Tripped once and busted open my knee.” Alex smiles. “Don’t laugh, that’s what you did then. Just stood there and laughed at me while I hobbled off the field. Walked to the nurse all by myself.”

They tread water, and Charles trails off. He’s still having a one-sided conversation, but it’s different. Finally, he knows Alex is really listening. Alex came to him. The conversations may be one sided, but the affection is not.

When Charles graduates later that year before Alex, the blonde boy crawls into his bed and cries. What starts in silence ends in sobs. Charles is his bravest yet; he holds that Summers boy all through the night, and in the morning leaves an address.

In all the time he spent never speaking to Charles, Alex makes up for it in written word, and Charles realizes in all that time he never shut up that he forgot to tell Alex the most important thing.


End file.
